Saint Joseph Catholic Church

Such attacks are an “assault on the peace and spiritual fabric of our country,” the bishops said after an armed robber’s violent January 27 attack on a priest.

Sierra Leone, a West African nation of 9.3 million (map), is 67% Muslim, 19% ethnic religionist, and 11% Christian.

The Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life began a three-day plenary assembly on February 4, only the third such assembly since the dicastery’s establishment in 2016, and the first such assembly since 2023.

In the four-minute video, filmed in San Pellegrino in Vaticano and released on February 5, Pope Leo began, “Lord Jesus, who welcomed the little ones in your arms and blessed them tenderly, today we bring before you the children living with incurable illnesses.”

The Pope concluded:

Make of us a Church that, animated by the feelings of your Heart and moved by prayer and service, knows how to uphold fragility, and in the midst of suffering, becomes a source of comfort, a seed of hope, and a proclamation of new life. Amen.

The Vatican announcement followed the Society’s own announcement that the Society’s bishops will consecrate new bishops on July 1.

Cardinal Fernández told The Pillar that “we have been exchanging letters in recent times. Next week I will meet with Father Pagliarani in the DDF to try and find a fruitful path of dialogue.”

The Society was founded in 1970 by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre (1905-1991). Archbishop Lefebvre’s ordination of four bishops in 1988 without a pontifical mandate led to the automatic excommunications of the prelate and the four bishops. In 2009, the Congregation for Bishops issued a decree remitting the excommunications, a decision that Pope Benedict XVI explained in a subsequent letter.